I admit I am not well versed on epilepsy. With the grace of God I have not been forced to learn quickly. I do know that if you breed long enough you will get one of everything, so after hearing this story last night, I thought I would put it out there and ask. A bitch produces a puppy who seizes (diagnosed and being treated with meds - epilepsy) and then come to find out there are others. The bitch started out on lease and co-owned. Co-owner tells other "No more breeding". But 2 more litters are produced and still in breeding program. One being a repeat breeding with same sire and dam.
Question 1 - Do you continue to breed mother?
2- Do you continue to breed littermates? Repeat breeding siblings?
3- Do you stand young boys from repeat breeding at stud on pre lims or finals?
4- Should you sell offspring from Dam on full registration?

Are we any closer to finding out how Epilepsy is passed on? I know we are guessing with TVD (but it seems to have some truth to it). Do we have an inkling about where the epilepsy comes from? I have to admit, none of this story is shocking to me when I found out who it was BUT I am trying to be sensible in understanding that you don't eliminate an entire line without hard core facts.

Here is what I was taught more than 10 years ago:

1. If a dog with epilepsy is bred to a bitch and pups have seizures, SHE CANNOT be clear. She is a carrier.

2. If the epileptic bitch/dog is bred to a normal/clear all the puppies will be carriers but none will have epilepsy.

Now, to your last question ... NEVER SELL on a full registration.

I don't know if epilepsy is passed as simply as PRA and EIC is. Normal/Carrier/Affected. Wouldn't that be nice though. I had a litter. A keeper seizes occaisonally, no meds, pulled out of program. A sibling in a pet home also seizes, but in a different manner, so not sure what they are really seeing. Never saw it in the bitch line before. Can't find out if it's in the sire line...some say Yes, others say No. Both sides are trustworthy, but who knows.

Used the bitch one more time with a different sire, totally different lines. Pups are still too young to see if anything happens yet.

Since we don't know anything and can't prove anything. I would stick to not breeding affected dogs, and try to breed to other pedigrees rather than line breed if you breed a sibling. That's the best we can do. Folks are not going to remove whole lines of dogs due to one or two seizing dogs.

Seizures are a symptom, not a disease. One of the most common vet diagnosis, without a complete work up, for a seizing dog is "epilepsy". this equates to many cases being misdiagnosed. You need a thorough exam including neurological before claiming a diagnosis of "epilepsy". Many disorders that result in seizures are not neurological. They can be metabolic, infectious, and inflammatory. Sme of these disorders can be genetic and can be inherited. You need to know for sure before calling any seizure disorder " epilepsy". This is the same as saying that any dog who limps has hip dysplasia.

Until you have all the facts, you can't make any kind of informed decision and are at risk of spreading a lot of false information.

Good luck to the dog.

Me2 is smart. They don't even know enough yet about epilepsy in humans. How could they possible know anything substantial yet about canines? Many many factors weigh in when you have a seizing dog.

We have bred 1 dog who started experiencing grand mall seizures when he was around 1 yr old. He was in a pet home, already neutered. We ruled out poisons as the cause of his seizures. He was never put on meds until he was 4 yrs old which is about the time the family surrendered their boy to us. We've had this wonderful boy for almost 2 yrs now. When we were first told of this dog's seizures, I arranged to have blood drawn on this boy, his sister and the sister's 2 young daughters we still had with us. The mother of this boy had already gone to her retirement home. The blood was sent to the University that heads up the epilepsy research.
After talking with the lady at the university, I was told that our boy's seizures are probably not hereditary since none of our boy's litter mates ( 10 pups ) had seizured to date. They are now 6 yrs old.
2 other vets I go to said that they think his seizures are most likely a congenital issue. I look back on what occured during whelping the 10 pups and there was a yellow boy puppy that appeared to be dead on arrival. I spent 5 minutes performing mouth to mouth, he finally came to life. Perhaps this is the same boy puppy who grew up to have seizures. I did not put ribbons on this particular boy and make notes at the time at the time of whelping this litter.
There is a great grandfather in this boy's pedigree who was suppose to have produced lots of epilepsy but our boy's sire who was used a ton, never produced epilepsy that I know of. I never worried about it being in my lines after I was told it was a congenital issue.
I do feel that genetic epilepsy is a recessive disease but like EIC, I think there is poly traits and it's not a cut and dry gene.

Me2 - sound reasoning and good common sense!

Of course we should breed responsibly and use our conscience to make informed decisions. This does not however give us the right to spread "facts" about dogs, unless they are fully documented. As far as I know, primary/idiopathic epilepsy in the Labrador has not yet been genetically mapped. Speaking of which, specialists have questioned the assumption that, within any breed, epilepsy is inherited in one mode.

I'm confused. I thought congenital disorders are inherited genetic disorders. Same thing, I thoughy.

A congential condition is present at birth. It may or may not be genetic.
An acquired condition develops some time after birth. It can be from an infection, an inflammation, it might be from the deteriorization of an organ as a result of an introduced agent or from the body's aging process or immune system, etc.

If you have a Labrador who has seizures and you ruled out environmental causes such as eating poisons, you then should start looking at all this seizing dog's siblings. Start calling all the families who adopted the pups from that litter.
In my case, our boy who started seizuring when he was 1 yr old had 9 other siblings, one in a show, one with me, other 7 pups in pet homes. I called every owner of these pups when the pups were 2.5 yrs old and non of those dogs had yet seizured. they are now 6 yrs old and so far so good.
Now if our seizuring boy had inherited epilepsy, according to the studies from the university involved in the genetic study, there should have been more pups in my litter seizuring. The dam of our boy never seizured and she had 3 litters. Non of those pups seizured, nor did any of the pups from 3 generations down.
As a breeder, you need to start making calls to your families every year or so to make sure those dogs are healthy and not developing health issues. I've had several families fail to contact me about major issues that cropped up when I did my annual calls. They just didn't think it was important or they claimed they forgot. We had problems with torn cruciates in my old lines and some families failed to call me to let me know what was going on.
We go over the list of genetic problems that Labradors are known for and why it is important to me that families keep in touch with me over the years so I know what direction my breeding program is going in .
Some of you may have more epilepsy going on in your lines than you realize or more orthopedic problems than you realized. No news isn't necessarily good news

Question 1 - Do you continue to breed mother? Only to a stud with non know epilepsy. Since most breeders aren't publicly honest about deceases, you can only count with your own dogs/lines or the ones from breeders that are very closed to you.

2- Do you continue to breed litter mates? Repeat breeding siblings?Same as question 1 answer.

3- Do you stand young boys from repeat breeding at stud on pre lims or finals? absolutely no.

4- Should you sell offspring from Dam on full registration? Absolutely no.

Are we any closer to finding out how Epilepsy is passed on? I believe so. Some serious research is being done.
Do we have an inkling about where the epilepsy comes from? Only with a DNA test we can know who has it or not.

If the bitch/stud are not of a high genetic value, then by any means, have them spayed and neuter, same for all their kids. They idea is to eliminate the decease, not spread it out.

Once we have a DNA test(s), then we will be able to take better decisions.

"I look back on what occured during whelping the 10 pups and there was a yellow boy puppy that appeared to be dead on arrival. I spent 5 minutes performing mouth to mouth, he finally came to life. Perhaps this is the same boy puppy who grew up to have seizures. I did not put ribbons on this particular boy and make notes at the time at the time of whelping this litter."

I know of a seizing dog of another breed which also needed extensive resuscitation at birth, interesting. One of my mentors always told me before I purchase from another breeder, ask pup's birth history. And never keep a hard to start pup.

My hard to start pup is my strongest, BEST male that I have in my house. No seizures, but his littermate was an easy birth and seizes. So while you think there MIGHT be a correlation, it's not 100%.

To Take Off the Blinders...I'm sure alot of breeders who have discovered one of their dogs have started seizuring, they don't want to stir up the pot by contacting all the owners of the siblings to the seizuring dog. I can see why breeders don't want to contact other breeders who have their dogs which can be even worse because of how the gossip spreads. Neither fear is counter productive in solving any sort of genetic problem.
Our companion homes appreciate any knowledge where their dog is concerned so why not make those annual calls to see how their dog is doing and reinforce how important it is to your breeding program that you are kept up to date on any health issues that may pop up with their dog, including allergies. Allergies is another big one in our breed but for some reason, breeders will continue breeding their dogs who constantly get hot spots, continual ear infections related to allergies, chewing on feet etc. These dogs should not be bred.

I know only too well how difficult it can be to find out about all the puppies we produce. I was flabbergasted when someone who had a 6 year old casually mentioned that he still had the occasional seizure. They didn't think it was a big deal. Argh!!!! So I thought long and hard and came up with a "birthday email" to be sent out a few days after a birthday. Here it is. Please feel free to use it as is or to modify it to work for you.


Hi All,

The kids just turned ____ and I hope everyone had a good year and a great birthday. As a breeder, I want to know how everyone is doing. It helps me make appropriate breeding choices in the future. Of course, I hope for glowing reports, but please share what you can, not only the good stuff. Comments on personality, quirks, training, medical problems or anything else you might have encountered would be very helpful. I really appreciate your input!

And don't forget to send pictures!

Joan